Metro magazine puts on a fresh face

Lauren Quaintance wants to attract a new generation of readers to the 25-year-old Metro magazine. Picture / Jackie Meiring

A young journalist is preparing to take the helm of Auckland's ageing flagship monthly as it attempts to attract a new generation of readers.

Critically acclaimed journalist Lauren Quaintance is returning from Australia to take the reins of Metro magazine from Nicola Legat, who has left for publishing company Random House.

The 31-year-old Wellingtonian takes charge in December, six months before the magazine turns 25.

Metro regularly sold 40,000 copies a month in its heyday, but reader numbers have fallen over the years.

Under Legat, they have started to pick up, aided by a new larger, glossy format.

For the first six months of the year, circulation was 18,494, up 10 per cent from its last audit. Readership for the year to June was also up, 5 per cent to 166,000.

The magazine remains a critical darling, featuring prominently at media and magazine awards.

Quaintance said that although Metro remained "the authority" on all things Auckland, its maturity as a title meant it needed to keep evolving.

"It's not selling what it was in its heyday, and I think the challenge is to attract a new generation of readers.

"People who loved Metro in the '80s, some of them have obviously drifted away from the magazine, and perhaps the magazine hasn't done as good a job of converting a new generation of Aucklanders that it's an essential read.

"I think the thing to say is that it's not necessarily the magazine it was in the days of Felicity Ferret. Nicola Legat moved away from some of the nastier tones that Metro perhaps had over the years, and I'd like to build on that in the sense that I think it's important for it not to be a magazine for journalists writing about journalists, with all the insiders' gossip. I don't think that's the way to make people feel that it's the magazine they feel included in."

Quaintance sees merit in diversifying the magazine's often lengthy investigative features with shorter guide-like pieces.

"I guess I hope to produce a magazine that encourages people to explore Auckland in the same way that they would if they were visiting Sydney or Budapest.

"I sort of see a narrowing of the focus on Auckland. I don't think it's our job to cover Iraq," Quaintance said.

"There are plenty of publications doing that. Everything has to be viewed through the lens of Auckland and Aucklanders."

She said the issues facing Auckland were much like those facing Sydney, naming traffic and roading, power supply and stability, and pollution as three key ones.

Quaintance believes the magazine can survive despite an increasingly competitive market and a global drop in print media audiences.

"Great brands will always survive, but whether newspapers and magazines can turn around that decline really does depend on figuring out what you're about and your niche."

Metro's deputy editor, Bevan Rapson, is filling in until Quaintance takes over on December 5.

Meet the editor

* Name: Lauren Quaintance, Wellingtonian, 31.

* Current job: Assistant editor of the(sydney)magazine, a monthly.

* CV: Twice named the Qantas Media Awards magazine feature writer of the year as staff writer for North & South. Also worked for the Herald, Sunday Star Times and Britain's Sunday Times.

* Claim to fame: Was in New York on a journalism scholarship in 2001 when the Twin Towers fell.